Skin-Changers
by Romancing Crossover
Summary: Well, what a pickle. Mean mister rainbow Saruman decided he wanted some skin-changers on his side. Only, he'll sorta lose them... and they'll go galumphing off with the Fellowship, helping the Ringbearer and Co. on their multitudinous quests. NOT Extra-Walkers, not very Mary-Sue-ish.
1. Chapter 1

Saruman the Many-Colored stood atop Orthanc, looking over Isengard, mentally planning for the machines he wanted to build. But those pesky trees had to go first.

On a different wagon-train of thought, he needed servants. Powerful servants, who could easily spy out any information he might want to know and destroy his enemies. Of course, he had needed something like this for awhile, but he had never found a way to create one before, so he had turned to birds and beasts, and now he was using Orcs and Goblins. But they just didn't have that… that _uniqueness_ he needed… But now, he had found somehing. The reason he could not find any beings powerful enough for his needs and yet with the knowledge worth more than a Dwarven-made suit of _mithril_ armour. It was because the future of Middle-earth had already been written. He could not go against it without creating a devestating paradox.

Of course, Saruman being the brilliant wizard he is, asked himself a question: who wrote the future? And could they change it? This thread of ideas led him to deduce a solution for his need. He would call two beings from the realm of the written-future. He would make them into powerful weapons, and they would tell him all he needed to know so he _could _change the future. A good, solid plan, without risk of interdimensional paradoxes.

But then there was a matter of strength. With the creatures he needed being outside the world he knew, would Saruman have enough magical skill and energy needed to bring them to Middle-earth and mold them as he wanted to? Well, there's only one way to find out.

Concentrating, the Istar sank deep into himself. From an outside observer, it would look as if he had fallen asleep standing up, slumped on his staff, his beard fluttering with his breath. But his mind wandered beyond the boundaries of space and time.

He came across a Man who possessed the knowledge he needed, and Saruman just about chose him. But at the last moment, he backed away. The stubbornness of a male might make his job more difficult. He would take a female. Two females, if he could. It's always good to have a back-up.

Ah, here are two excellent specimens! Two young daughters of Men, with heads full of the extensive information that he craved. Quickly he snatched them up.

Now, to make them strong. What should he do to them? Give them magical powers? No, no, that would basically mean turning them into one of the Ainur, and even Saruman was not that powerful. Turn them into animals? No, that would simply _decrease_ their strength, not to mention their intelligence. But that gave him an idea. Of course he knew of Beorn, the skin-changer, and the Beornings, of whom it was said that skin-changing had been inherited. He remembered Gandalf's description of the great black bear charging through Orcs and Goblins at the Battle of the Five Armies. Skin-changers were mighty beings. Just the sort of servants he could use.

So he morphed them. Of course, they weren't in the written-future realm, nor were they in Arda. They were in the nothingness in between them. Saruman put them there only because he felt they would be safer there, and it took a lot less magical energy to change them there. He gave them seven forms each, and began to draw them to Middle-earth.

Now, this was the tricky part. His energy was nearly spent, and there were many invisible magical boundaries around Arda. He was just about there, nearly _tasting_ the information his new servants held, when…

A bird flew up to him and cawed in his face. He knew what it was trying to say. _Gandalf is still in the Shire with the hobbits, Gandalf is still in the Shire with the hobbits._ He sent out birds to spy on his fellow Istari. Why would he trust a crazy brown loner with, as he told the White Council over fifty years ago, "an excessive consumption of mushrooms," or a grey wanderer with an obsession over short people with abnormal feet?

But at the moment, this messenger was _most_ unwelcome. It threw Saruman's concentration off completely, and his two creations went rocketing off towards the first location his frazzled brain came up with: _the Shire_. Exactly where he _didn't_ want them to go. And it was_ all that stupid bird's fault!_

Saruman sighed in anger and tried to shoo away his spy, but it refused to leave, holding out a tiny pouch on its leg. Grumbling, the Istar dug out a golden Galleon—What? Even the Wise have to learn, and Hogwarts is pretty much the best darn place to learn!—placed it in the pouch, and sent the bird away.

He would not have enough energy to try and do this again for a very long while. Stupid bird. Stupid Gandalf. Stupid mushrooms.

And so, grumbling to high heaven, Saruman the Many-Colored planned world-domination atop the black tower of Isengard…


	2. Chapter 2

"Hurry up, Pippin, or I'll eat all the carrots without you!" Merry laughed, dashing through the scrub. He and his cousin had just swiped a couple bags of vegetables from an unsuspecting farmer.

"No! No, don't! I want some!" Pippin bounded over a bush in his haste to stop Merry's gluttony.

The two were making their way to a secret clearing that only they knew about. It was in a particularly thick stretch of trees no hobbit had ever bothered to clear out. Rumors were that this copse used to be connected to the Old Forest, and any respectable hobbit beyond his tweens wouldn't set foot in there. Of course, "respectable," is hardly the word most would use to describe Merry and Pippin. The clearing was perfect, with a tiny little ankle-deep stream and the sort of mud that made the best rock-hard pellets for distractions. And it was just hidden enough that any angry elder coming after them wouldn't find them.

Laughing, Merry tripped into the glade. But when he saw what was there, he froze, all sounds dying in his mouth. Pippin followed soon after, and was about to ask what the matter was when he followed Merry's line of sight and froze as well.

The first most noticable thing was the big brownish-grey wolf lying on a patch of grass, asleep. The second was the petite deer standing midway in the stream, frozen in fear, with the biggest, most pitiful green eyes either hobbit had ever seen.

And so they all remained immobile: the doe staring at the hobbits, the hobbits staring at the wolf, and the wolf dozing on in blissful ignorance.

Eventually, Pippin screwed up the courage to lean over and whisper in his cousin's ear: "Merry, that's a wolf."

"Shhh! You'll wake it up!" Merry said in a very loud whisper.

"I don't think so, Merry," He gulped nervously. "I thought wolves didn't live in the Shire."

"They don't. The last time a wolf was seen here was in the Fell Winter, when the Brandywine froze over and the white wolves attacked and they sounded the Horn-call of Buckland."

"Then what is one doing here?"

"I don't know, Pip."

Pippin glanced at the doe, who hadn't moved except to blink. "That deer is very brave to stay here with a wolf."

"I don't think she understands the danger."

"Shouldn't we get out of here, before it wakes up?"

"Excellent idea…"

But before the hobbits could back away, the deer shot out a back hoof and cracked the canine sharply in the ribs. It yelped and jumped up immediately, growling. Then it saw the hobbits and went stock-still, scared.

Another stare-down commenced. Again, Pippin leaned over after a few minutes and said in an even quieter whisper, "I think they're more afraid of us than we are of them."

The wolf snorted suddenly and the cousins jumped a foot off the ground, ready to run for the hills in fright. The deer seemed to snap out of a daze and tentatively crossed to the hobbits' side of the stream. She approached them ever so slowly, as if _they_ were the dangerous animals who might attack her at any moment. Pippin was just about ready to scream and faint.

About a foot in front of them, the doe paused. Cautiously, she extended her head and sniffed them. She began to circle the two, snuffling all the way. Occasionally she'd prod the two with her nose. The wolf did nothing, only watching the scene with what seemed to be an amused expression.

To the greatest relief of Merry and Pippin, the deer backed away. She turned and brayed softly at the wolf, to which the canine barked back. The hobbits flinched. The doe snorted and bugled again, more insistantly this time. Sighing, the wolf got up and, growling and grumbling, crossed the stream to the hobbits. It would be fair to say that the cousins had not yet experienced such a terror in their lives before that point. Merry quaking, Pippin shaking, the doe standing behind them and—they imagined—cutting off any escape, the wolf advanced, its keen brown eyes studying them. And just as they thought they would be supper for a terrible predator…

The wolf laid down at their feet and rolled over onto its back with a doggy smile, tongue lolling.


End file.
